He arrives with the first attacks of flu, as frisky as a virus, as rich as a Yule log. Gaston Lepeteur, alias Venerable Tenant of Seeing Luminosity and Unlimited Humility, Grand Master of the Inner Force which leaves alone, Illustrious Image of Multidirectional Simplicity, Keeper of the Impetuous Lighthouse of Timeless Darkness, alias Grand Mage Kivatnikeh. We met him, at the risk of our livers, in a luxurious hotel on the Côte d’Azur.
Inad: Great Mage, you had disappeared from circulation. Did you have any problems?
Kivatnikeh: Yes. I no longer knew how to spend the enormous amount of money that I was taking from the gogos.
Inad: That much? We thought that with all the crooks that INAD managed to bring to justice, the public would be less gullible.
Kivatnikeh: You still believe in Santa Claus! Believe me, I’ve never had so many customers.
Inad. All the same, people are informed, warned. TV, radio, internet: we constantly talk about clairvoyance scams. There has to be a time when people stop being fooled.
Kivatnikeh: It’s not tomorrow the day before. Imagine that I have never made so much money.
Inad: At that point?
Kivatnikeh: Yes, that’s even why I came back to France. My teams can no longer keep up with the demand. Just think, thanks to Facebook and Twitter, people now only live in a virtual world. They have 547 virtual friends and suffer even more from loneliness.
Inad: Aren’t you exaggerating a little? These days, when you’re going through a difficult time, you can always find someone to talk to.
Kivatnikeh: No, my friend. We have never had so many means of communication. And people have never felt so alone. Look around you. People expose the slightest event of their private life on the internet, even the most insignificant. We comment on each other, we tease each other, we say a “joke” or a “poke”, we send each other hundreds of text messages. But in the evening, when you turn off your computer or smartphone, you are all alone. For what? Because people go on social media to show off their lives, to feel like they’re famous. In reality, they don’t care about anyone else. What they want is to be seen by as many people as possible. So, when things go badly, they realize that this multitude of friends is just an electronic mirage. And when they have problems, they realize that others don’t give a damn about them. A fair return of things in fact.
Inad: And that’s where you come in?
Kivatnikeh: Exactly. In the 20 years that I have been doing this type of scam, I have not changed my tactics. A little publicity, someone calls me, I pick up, and off I go to fill my piggy bank.
Inad: Yes, we know the method. You create some empathy, you pretend to listen and…
Kivatnikeh: There I stop you. I’m not pretending. I really listen to what people tell me. This is even the basis of the scam: making people talk and bringing out to them the things they said 5 minutes before by making them believe that it is clairvoyance. And when it comes to their future, it’s even simpler. It will be better tomorrow…or later. Or even not at all if a mean person around them blocks their development out of jealousy. In which case we will have to do a long and juicy occult work. Finally juicy for me!
Inad: Say, you’re not afraid to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs by giving us your tips forscam people?
Kivatnikeh: Me afraid? Never. Inad has been doing prevention for 25 years, TV and newspapers have been warning people against scams. And there are always so many gogos who fall into the trap. I told you, solitude is our best prescriber. And there is nothing better than a virtual world to increase the phenomenon. So I’m going to put in place new ways to extract money from this windfall that people’s growing selfishness gives us.
Inad: Oh good? Not making enough money?
Kivatnikeh: The more we have, the more we want. And then I have costs. You don’t know what it costs to maintain a private paradise island with a residence, servants, a yacht and all the bells and whistles. Not to mention the plane trips back and forth to collect the money I earned through the hard work of the students for whom I pay a pittance.
Inad: You are incredibly cynical!
Kivatnikeh: Yes, that’s what made my fortune. And my titles of nobility.
Inad: What titles?
Kivatnikeh: you see, I was recently elected Best Clairvoyant in France, also Gold Star of the Crystal Ball, again Gold Medalist of the clairvoyance fair of Trifoullis les Oies, I was named Doctor Honoris Causa of the International Institute of Ambulatory Metaphysics, High Medium of the Universal Parietal Circle, Platinum Parchment of the Magnetizers of Europe, Grand Chamberlain of the Society of the Ancient Maya, etc.
Inad: Who awarded you all these titles?
Kivatnikeh: Myself. I self-diploma, like my colleagues. It reassures the badgers. Clairvoyance is like wine. The nicer the label, the more people pay. It doesn’t matter whether we sell wind or piquette. Appearances are all that matters today.
Inad: This kind of crude manipulation cannot last forever.
Kivatnikeh: If you say so… In the meantime, it’s working so well that I’m going to diversify my activities.
Inad: You are already a clairvoyant, medium, spiritualist, numerologist, astrologer, palmist, marabout, string reader, cartomancer, necromancer… What more are you going to do?
Kivatnikeh: Coaching.
Inad: Coaching? In what?
Kivatnikeh: In everything and especially in anything. Family relationships, internet shopping, cooking, business relationships, games, styling, poker, cycling, writing, brushing your teeth. I am setting up an internet platform which will be called Les coaches savants. People will be able to call for help on any subject. At 6 euros per minute, I guarantee you that I will be a disaster.
Inad: I see. You will still hire students to do the work for you with the promise of extraordinary salaries.
Kivatnikeh: Not at all. Anyone can register on my site. It will be enough for this person to think that they know better than others on a subject for me to induct them as a learned Coach. And this person will then be able to make a huge turnover. Think about it, people no longer even know how to put one foot in front of the other without asking the advice of four loved ones, two coaches, a psychologist, five psychics, an astrologer, a kinesiologist. Well on my platform they will find all that. At the ridiculous price of 6 euros per minute or 360 euros per hour.
Inad: And what do you have to gain from the story? These are your great coaches who will line their pockets. Would you have become a philanthropist?
Kivatnikeh: Me, but I continue to make a fortune without risk on theon the backs of the brats who call to find out what they should do, and on the backs of the brats who act like mega coaches. Pseudo coaches bill the gogos and therefore take on the risks of being prosecuted for fraud, false advertising or mental manipulation. I invoice coaches for the services provided: access fee, monthly subscription, percentage of turnover, false ratings, special recommendations, promotion on the site. And I offer them paid packs, not obligatory of course, but strongly recommended if you want to be clearly visible on the site: presence pack (A color photo in 2x2 millimeter format and a purple border frame), tranquility pack (a real acrylic feather pillow), electronic pack (two LR3 batteries), video pack (a super 8 camera and a video cassette to record a message which will be broadcast on the site on February 29).
Inad: Great Mage, I see that the scam has a bright future ahead of it. What can we wish you for 2013?
Kivatnikeh: Nothing, I have everything. And I know that it’s not going to stop in 2013. Given the growing number of people who live in the present moment without taking the time to think or educate themselves.
Comments collected by Bertrand CAILAC
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